1. Field of the Invention:
The present invention relates to a portable terminal having a call function. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for operating a call function of a portable terminal that may simply execute a call function while operating various applications, and intuitively provide a call relation interface.
2. Description of the Related Art:
With the advancements in information and communication technologies and semiconductor technologies, the supply and use of all types of portable terminals have rapidly increased. In particular, recent portable terminals reflect a convergence of traditional communications functions and other functions. As a representative example of the portable terminals, a mobile communication terminal provides various functions such as a TeleVision (TV) watching function (e.g., mobile broadcasting such as Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) or Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB)), a music playing function (e.g., Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG)-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer-3 (MP3)), a photographing function, and an Internet access function as well as a general communication function such as speech call or message transmission/reception.
Meanwhile, to execute a call function while operating various applications in a portable terminal of the related art, after an executed application is terminated, a call interface is called to execute a call function or a call interface is called by multi-tasking to execute the call function. Further, in the portable terminal of the related art, after calling a call interface, the call interface may directly input contact information (e.g., a phone number of another portable terminal) of a target for executing a call function, or execute a call function by searching contact information registered in a phone-book. However, the user may experience inconvenience when executing a call function during operation of a certain application in a portable terminal of the related art.
Furthermore, when the user of the portable terminal of the related art intends to respond to a message received while using an electronic service, the user may easily respond using a message. However, responding to the message using a call to a user that transmitted the message would be inconvenient because a call function would have to be executed according to the procedure described above.